Coving

[Neenaw20]

I am looking for some advise. I am renovating the downstairs of my Edwardian house and have replastered the sitting room stripping out coving and picture rail (It wasn’t original and was bog standard £5 a square metre stuff). The architect thinks we shouldn’t reinstate the coving or the picture rail as the room is small, with lots of corners and it looks too busy/messy. I have an original fireplace and a ceiling rose and they add character but my position has always been that I would put back the coving and picture rail.

The room does look bigger without them and the wall space is much more usable but am worried it will be harsh and that I will miss the period features. I have attached pictures below. What do you guys think? Before and after pictures below

We had that ceiling rose in our old house. The ceiling didn't have coving - the plaster was curved like coving, but without a join. This might be why the replacement cheapo coving looks wrong.

In your position I would put in chunky posh coving but leave without picture rails.

Swimming against the tide but I think the architect's right. Coving will look too fussy with that fireplace.

@WinterAndRoughWeather thanks so much for this!

Absolutely love a recommendation especially with great pricing. I feel coving is the equivalent to bakers wedding cake, depending on the job the price sky rockets!

@showmethegin

We are renovating an Edwardian house at the moment and have just bought new coving but that is sympathetic to the period. There is a formula to follow ie ceiling height relating to height or drop of the coving to ensure it looks in proportion.

It's a personal choice but I would expect coving in a period house; it was the first thing I noticed was missing when we viewed the house. It makes rooms look 'finished'.

I completely agree. We live in a colonial (Georgian) home and have crown molding in every room. Period houses look odd without it, in my view. Personally I'm not a fan of picture rails because I think walls look cleaner without them, but the crown molding is a must!

You may struggle to get coving to fit the rounded bit of the corner. The space above the window is very narrow as well from the look on the pics so may be limiting what coving you can have